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A Progress Report on the UN Millennium Development Goals

By Opportunity International

In September of 2000, the United Nations addressed the issue of global poverty by adopting the Millennium Declaration. The declaration pledged the members to accomplish measurable goals to eradicate global poverty by the year 2015. The Millennium Development Goals focus on eight areas of concern, including poverty and hunger, universal education, maternal health, and HIV/AIDS prevention.

With the deadline now only five years away, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has called upon world leaders to attend a summit this September to assess and accelerate the progress towards reaching these goals. From un.org: “Coming amid mixed progress and new crises that threaten the global effort to halve extreme poverty, [Mr. Ban says,] ‘The summit will be a crucially important opportunity to redouble our efforts to meet the goals,’ [...] by the 2015 deadline.”

A couple weeks ago, four commentators participated in a discussion for a radio broadcast from the 2010 InterAction Forum in Washington, DC, asking “How far has the world come, and how far do we have to go?” And they shared their assessments of the progress made so far toward the Millennium Goals.

Opportunity International offers microfinance solutions to empower people in the developing world to work their way out of poverty. Learn about the many ways to get involved in the microfinance movement by visiting opportunity.org.